Thanks for your comments:
Ok you smart brainy types. So the Asiana is a 777 200ER.
In the meantime, yes we are talking 1979 when I took the Northwest Orient (yes it was called that then) 747 from SFO to Narita and Osaka and Taipei by way of Honolulu. Why they routed it that way, I have no clue but I was on the plane and it was a 747 and it flew that way. Thats all I can say.
Now I dont expect premium airlines like JAL to be upgrading people willy nilly and dilute the product. IF , and this is an IF, SFO to and from Narita consistently shows near empty First Class and Business Class an airline (now being state owned JAL is not as exposed to profit/loss as others are) who wants to maximize its profits would look at that situation and say hmmmm. They would likely do what EVA does and drop First Class entirely and sell Business for half price or less to fill it. Obviously there still is a fat profit margin, otherwise they can drop Business Class altogether as well. Fact is flying a seat empty is revenue gone forever, just like an empty hotel room is. And theres little value for that. I dont imagine CX would do that for long, flying a bunch of empty seats around. I mean the JAL 777-300ER has about 9 First Class cubicles and about 62 Biz seats. WAy too many for the demand it would appear.
Granted maybe my two flights were a fluke and not representative of the actual annual demand.
The BMW 3 and 7 analogy is kinda cute but to be truer to the situation it would have to be that the 7 series is going to be sent to the crusher if they dont sell it that day (a seat unsold is lost revenue forever) so why not sell it for whatever they can get for it or sell it to the 3 series buyer and get another person to buy the 3 series. Granted an airline has to maintain some sort of order and image but long term flying of empty seats leads to RED INK on the bottom line and a good manager would rectify that situation.